You all know I love making gift and favor boxes from recycled food packaging. I had a ton of fun making these for my demo today. The small boxes are from a yogurt stick box, covered with a page of text from an art magazine I get that has really nice paper, and decorated with an assortment of flowers cut on the Cricut from security envelopes . These ones are black and white, and I also have saved a bunch with blue and white lining and even some red and white (I'm thinking Valentine's Day next year). The larger box uses pages from the same art magazine, otherwise on its way to the recycling box. I cut strips at random widths, decoupaged them to a remarkably sturdy cracker box, and used the Quantity feature to cut a ton of flowers from a couple of other pages that worked for color. Glitter paint, buttons - there we go. Later I can cut the recipient's name or other message on either a hang tag or to be affixed directly. These are going to by my next holiday gift packages. M

Here's my Michaels demoing schedule for this week and weekend. I'll be at the Hawthorne store : Thursday, April 22nd from 4.30pm until 9.00pm Friday, April 23rd from 4.30pm until 9.00pm, when you can also join in the monthly crop night group. Saturday, April 24th from 2.30pm until 7.30pm. Sunday, April 25th from 11.30am until 4.30pm. If you are in the area, please pop in and say hi! I can answer your questions about the Cricut Expression, Gypsy and the other fine crafting products made by Provocraft, and I'm even getting better at knowing my way around the Michaels store. I'll be posting some pretty layouts I've designed on the Gypsy as examples of a business promo use of the Cricut system. Plus I notice tons of kids coming into Michaels doing school projects about California Missions - guess it's that time of year. So I'm planning a mock project as a demo display. Good opportunity to learn something about the Missions. Pretty much all I know is that a coupl

I've created another collage figure for you. Download this Mermaid for free, print her and have fun. Please let me know if you make anything cool from her.

Included in the fabrics my MIL sent me, was a vintage yo-yo quilt. Or to be more accurate pieces of the top layer of a vintage yo-yo quilt. Quite stained and old, the quilt top is slowly deteriorating. Many of the pieces are silk, and some are vintage rayon. Some have separated into layers, and for some the hand stitches holding each rosette to its neighbor are the strongest part. I gently hand washed the bits I wanted to use in delicate detergent made for dolls clothing, and some disintegrated completely! However that doesn't mean that these elements can't be used for textile arts. For my most recent contribution to Coolaberration '09, Shimasani, I have appliqued washed pieces to a piece of lace and added beading and embroidery to make her underskirt, as well as attaching rosettes to the lining of her velvet cape. More pictures soon, when she is complete. I also have made a whole bunch of these small beaded buttons. Some have found their way onto Shimasani, and here are th